


Emotional Noise

by missmishka



Series: Emotional Noise [1]
Category: Bourne Legacy (2012)
Genre: ...and technically not even in a relationship to 'break up', Angst, M/M, Slash, aaron has something of a clothes kink, breaking up is even harder to do when you're embroiled in governmental black ops, eric has a beard kink, pre to post-movie, this porn has plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-31
Updated: 2012-08-31
Packaged: 2017-11-13 03:47:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/499124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmishka/pseuds/missmishka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's only one thing that can bring Aaron back into the program after going off grid and, ironically enough, it's the same thing that had made him contemplate getting out from under it all to begin with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from the movie and the line explaining the LARX project. "It's Treadstone without the instability; Outcome without the emotional noise." Something about that just jumped out and screamed at me "Byer/Cross" and this is the result.
> 
> ~*~
> 
> DISCLAIMER: The usual warnings, I claim no ownership of these characters, they are simply borrowed with love and adoration from the original creators to have their stories, thoughts or circumstances embellished on a little more than the original format had done. Not for any profit.

Aaron doesn’t really know what he expected to happen when he deliberately skipped his check in. 

He knows such an action could easily get him killed if the US government thought one of their secret weapons had gone rogue, but he hadn’t much cared about the thought of looking up some day to find himself staring down the barrel of another operative’s gun.  It wasn’t that he was wanting or looking to die, he’s just tired.

Tired of the needles and the chems and the stripping himself naked for the clinical viewing and assessment of white coated doctors.

Tired of learning new languages and identities and ways to disguise himself for the next assignment to infiltrate some organization for intelligence gathering.  Tired of finding new ways to execute his sources once that intel was passed on and tired of avoiding his own eyes in the mirror as he tries to justify the betrayed expression on his target’s face as their life ends.

Most of all he’s tired of the solitude. 

He can’t help but think that these missions would be easier to complete if he knew someone was waiting to greet him when he finished the assignment.  Someone other than the suits waiting to debrief him or the white coats waiting to study him.  Someone waiting for _him_ to come back safely to _them_.

He’s tried to find it since becoming Aaron Cross, but it doesn’t work.  His attempt at a relationship outside the military world had only left him with memories of June’s dark eyes staring at him with bitterness as she explained away her choosing another man as being Aaron’s own fault for never being there for _her._   And his attempt at a relationship inside the military world…

Thoughts of that relationship drive him to the hotel’s bar for the umpteenth time since he checked into the place five days ago.

He’s nursing his second scotch when he feels the presence behind him that he had known would be coming.

He hadn’t really expected Eric Byer to come to collect him and feels a flash of resentment at the man coming after him like a wayward puppy even while part of him warms at the knowledge that the man still cared enough to track him down.  He tries not to let the warmth spread; telling himself that the man is there for the operative, the government asset, not for Aaron himself. 

Eric puts his hand in the center of Aaron’s back, slender fingers spread wide to impress his presence on as much of Aaron’s body as possible.  The man wedges himself between the bar stools to lean against Aaron as he reaches to take the tumbler of scotch that Aaron has left forgotten on the bar.  Warmth spreads against his better judgment; warmth from physical contact as Eric’s body touches his side.

Eric puts the tumbler to his mouth, lips unerringly finding just where Aaron’s mouth had touched to drink from the glass and he knocks back the splash of alcohol remaining in the glass.  Aaron can imagine the burn of the liquid racing down the man’s throat from the action and his eyes move unbidden to watch the bob of Eric’s Adam’s apple as he swallows.

“That is vile,” Byer declares with a hiss as he puts the emptied glass back on the bar.  “Haven’t I taught you how to properly order a scotch?”

The hand on his back moves up to rub almost companionably at the back of Aaron’s neck and Aaron turns to tilt his head and meet the other man’s eyes.

“Are you really here to discuss my drinking choices?”

Eric’s thumb slips over the collar of Aaron’s shirt, skimming over bare skin and he has to stifle a shiver at such an intimate connection in a public setting.  Eric has never touched him with any hint of intimacy while there are unknown eyes upon them; too much risk of getting caught; revealing information that can be used by enemies for humiliation or ruin.

Something clouds his blue eyes as Eric avoids making direct eye contact with Aaron and Aaron has to wonder if it’s anything like the regret he himself feels for this place they find themselves in.  The fingers on his nape stop rubbing and squeeze lightly.

Byer’s been out of the field for quite some time and had never really had much use for his combat training as a flyboy in the Air Force, but Aaron knows that the man is more than capable of snapping his neck if that’s what the moment is leading to.  He rather likes the idea of Eric getting his own hands dirty for a change, hopes that it _means_ something that Eric has come to do it himself if Aaron is to be snuffed for his little rebellion.

“We need to talk,” Eric finally says as his hand drops away.

He shifts away to give Aaron room to rise while silently ordering Aaron to get up so that they can move the conversation to somewhere private.  Aaron wishes that the bastard hadn’t finished his drink because the bracing burn of the single-malt whisky would have been a nice diversion from thoughts of the scolding he was likely about to receive. 

The space Eric gives him proves to be insufficient and their bodies rub together as Aaron rises from the bar stool to leave after signaling the bartender to settle his tab with the added charge to his room bill.  The friction is more intoxicating than drink and Aaron feels the burn of it racing over his nerve endings. 

Eric doesn’t immediately move back to give him space and for a moment there isn’t a breath of space between them from chest to feet.

Aaron smells the man; crisp, clean and expensive.  It’s a scent that he’s never been allowed to become familiar with, but he’s smelled it often enough that it stirs faint recognition in his brain and brings to mind elusive memories of pleasure.  He's often sought it out; finding fragments of the smell, but nothing to compare to the real deal. He wants to bend forward to press his nose against the hollow of Eric’s long throat under the starched collar of his dress shirt, but he tips his head back instead to look questioningly at the taller man. 

The question goes unanswered as Eric turns to leave the bar and walk towards the elevators.

Aaron follows, trying not to notice or appreciate the leonine grace with which the man moves across the distance.  He’s seen rioting crowds part like the Red Sea for Eric and has never managed to emulate that powerful, stalking stride that demands and earns immediate passage in any situation.  Even with his best attempt to duplicate that walk, Aaron has felt clumsy and oafish; like a bull stomping and pushing its way through a throng of people.

The list of things that he had wanted and tried to learn from Eric Byer is embarrassingly long and Aaron knows that he’ll never get to complete it.  He doesn’t even know if he wants to learn any of it any more.  He still admires the man, but the awe and respect have dimmed greatly over the years.  Kenny Kitsom’s innocence and enthusiasm for all of this has faded almost completely from Aaron’s mind and that more than anything is what has driven him to drink. 

They get into the elevator and Eric pushes the button for Aaron’s floor without asking which one it is.  Aaron doesn’t comment on that; it’s Eric’s job to know such minor details and Eric Byer is damned good at his job. 

 _Too good_.

It’s why a relationship between them never could have worked; why Aaron understood all too well June’s reasons for ending their relationship. To her, Aaron has been 'unavailable' and to Aaron, a man like Eric is unattainable.

Byer lived and died by his honor; kept to his commitments to the letter regardless of any unintended or unsightly consequences. That commitment was first, foremost and forever to his country, he never even considered anything that might interfere with his patriotism.  A mere man like Aaron has never had a chance at swaying Eric from his duty.

There had been times, though, when he had wanted to; once, early on, when he had tried to.

The ride to the eighth floor is quiet and oddly lacking in tension; they’ve been here before and it had stopped being awkward years ago.  He doesn’t know what to expect and can never, even with his own enhancements, fathom what’s going on in Eric’s complicated brain so he just resigns to go with wherever this is going.  There’s no longer a reason for his gut to churn with emotions while he wonders if he’s in trouble or what his next grueling task is to be; whether he’s angered or disappointed Eric and if he’s about to get the shots he himself so often delivers – two to the center mass, one to the head; clean and clear execution.

Eric pulls a keycard from his shirt pocket and slots it into the electronic lock to open Aaron’s hotel room.  Again, this doesn’t surprise Aaron in the least and the scene in the bar makes more sense as he imagines how Eric had gotten the key to his room; likely playing the lover finally arriving to reunite with Aaron after a prolonged separation to convince the front desk to hand over a key so he wouldn't have to flash his credentials and stir up any intrigue by demanding the key.

_If only it were truth, not plausible fiction._ While it wasn't the homey kind of welcome scenario he like to entertain, he could have lived with their meeting up in random hotels after missions to check in with one another and just _be_ together for a few hours before having to go answer another call to duty. 

Aaron shakes off that line of thought and moves into his room cautiously; eyes and ears scanning for any signs of intrusion or threat.  Out of habit he checks the bathroom, closet and balcony then makes sure to close the curtains against any prying eyes before giving Eric the all-clear nod to enter. 

It was his training; ingrained now into the fabric of his being.  Use his muscle to protect and preserve the brains like Eric Byer; sacrifice self if need be and do it gladly with the knowledge that Eric would live on to see the work done.

There had been a time when he’d still been more Ken than Aaron where Aaron had thought his job noble in that aspect of protecting someone like Byer.  Those assignments, though, had been training runs for his true purpose and the novelty had faded as he went from protection details to assassination and instigating coups.

Eric checks the hallway with his own practiced eye before slipping into the room and closing the door with a snick of the lock that seems to echo in the quiet between them.  He slips the keycard back into his breast pocket while Aaron assumes a careless posture leaning against the wall in wait of the ass chewing he assumes to be coming.

He ends up reamed, but not in the way he ever would have allowed himself to imagine in this scenario.

Eric moves with the sudden, lethal skill of a cobra striking.  In a blink, he’s crossed from the door to stand before Aaron and fist his right hand in the front of Aaron’s shirt while the left hand slithers around Aaron’s neck to urge it into an arch that tilts his head back just as Eric bends to take him mouth.  The speed of events is such that Aaron can’t keep up so he’s slack and utterly malleable to Eric’s whims as the man shifts their bodies to tangle and press together against the wall while his tongue forges a slick path into Aaron’s mouth. 

When Aaron realizes that this is to be a seduction rather than a lecture or elimination he responds as he always does when trying to emulate Eric’s skill; clumsy and oafish, his hands feeling big and brutish as he puts them on the crisp Egyptian cotton of Eric’s shirt.  He fists the material, thinking fleetingly of the times when the man has taught him such things as how to order a decent single-malt scotch and how to appreciate the silk-like luxury of Egyptian cotton and other high-end fabrics.  Knowing the expense of the garment, he forces his fingers to ease their grip; unconsciously ironing at the wrinkles he made while Eric’s mouth moves away.

“Stop thinking,” the man orders into his ear before nipping at Aaron’s ear lobe.  “It’s just a shirt.”

He demonstrates his disregard for the item by pulling back and ripping it open despite the Mother of Pearl buttons sewn tightly to the garment which fight the harsh treatment until the stitching pops to send them flying. 

Aaron gapes a bit at this considering that that shirt cost upwards of $300, but he can do little more than blink his surprise before Eric is back on him. 

After that nothing matters outside the fact that he hasn’t had _this_ in over six months and Eric’s mouth is hot and hungry; his hands hard and grasping. 

Everything they were supposed to be outside of this hotel room is forgotten as inside the room they fall into being two men given privacy to kiss and touch and rut to their hearts content.  Only Aaron knows that his heart will find no contentment in this; his mind with find no ease with this coupling even after the sex buzzes his senses and leaves him languid with satiation.

He shuts off his brain with a bit of a struggle and rushes greedily toward that physical satisfaction.

Eric toes off his Italian loafers without regard for the expensive leather while Aaron’s hands yank at the white tee shirt that the man had worn beneath his button-up.  His mouth swoops to the pale expanse of Eric chest while the other man tugs up the hem of Aaron’s own tee shirt to pull the garment off.  His long fingers end up tangling in the fabric, though, with the shirt halfway up Aaron’s back when Aaron bites at the hardened nub of Eric’s nipple.

Aaron prides himself on being one of the few people who knew just how sensitive Byer’s nipples are and he uses the knowledge shamelessly; laving and biting at the man’s chest until Eric is arching into him with a hand digging into the back of Aaron’s skull to keep his face pressed hard against that writhing torso.  He feels the hard press of Eric’s dick against his hip and shifts back to wedge a hand between them and tear open the fastening to the man’s pants; bypassing the belt to be dealt with later.

Eric’s other hand untangles from Aaron’s shirt and moves to his jaw to stroke over the beard he’s grown over the course of his last assignment.  He turns into the touch, remembering dimly the last time he had grown a full beard and how Eric had seemed endlessly fascinated with the soft, bristling growth. 

Aaron tests a budding theory by deliberately dragging his chin over Eric’s nipples to tickle the nubs and the man’s cock leaps eagerly into Aaron’s hand as he moves to free it.  A groan escapes Eric’s lips and he shudders, but Aaron can’t be certain if it’s in response to the beard rasping over his chest or the calloused fingers curling familiarly around the slender length of his cock. 

The hand on the back of his head moves forward to his jaw and Eric rubs both his palms over the fuzz on Aaron’s face before he tightens his grip to angle Aaron’s mouth up for another kiss. 

Aaron keeps his hand in Eric’s pants; pulling hard and fast then slicking his fingers with the precum oozing from the man’s dick. 

Eric turns them until it’s his back pressed against the wall and takes one last lick at the depths of Aaron’s mouth like he’s searching out the last trace of cheap whisky to erase it from Aaron’s tongue.  He tears his mouth away with a wet smack as he looks Aaron in the eyes and moves his hands to Aaron’s shoulders to begin pushing down.

Aaron folds without hesitation, going to his knees with the taste of this man already stirring in his mind.  He gives the tip a swipe with the flat of his tongue by way of greeting after their long separation and the cock jerks as if in welcome. 

Aaron delays taking the length into his mouth despite the bite of Eric’s manicured fingernails into the meat of his shoulders.  He looks up to find Eric staring down at him with his narrow lips sucked in to stifle any sounds of pleasure he might make; the blue of his irises is still evident around his dilated pupils and Aaron wants those pupils blown out from pleasure.  Without breaking eye contact, he shifts forward to skim his chin down the length of Eric’s shaft to his groin then watching the blue turn to black as his beard drags on the flesh as he moves back toward the tip.

Eric’s whole body jolts at the caress and his lips burst open to shout out at curse when Aaron repeats the maneuver down the other side of the man’s dick.  His fingers scramble for purchase in Aaron’s hair to try forcing his mouth to take the leaking tip in and suck, but Aaron relishes this power he has over the man and bends forward to nuzzle instead.  He shoves at the concealment of Eric’s pants and boxers until he frees the man’s scrotum from the material; still not bothering to strip the clothing away as he has no intention of allowing the man to last long enough to get fully naked. 

Aaron wants Eric to always know and remember how he can reduce the man to this; needs to have the knowledge that he can strip the man of his all his power and prestige without removing his fancy clothes. 

It isn’t much to cling to, but it’s something and Aaron will take it over having nothing between them.

He tucks his chin against Eric’s balls, rubbing over the soft sac with his beard and mouthing at the base of the man’s dick as his testes draw taut from the tickle of soft whiskers.  Aaron has only a moment to wonder if he can actually make Eric come from this before the man shudders before him, groans out his name and comes apart with Aaron’s head turned so that his beard brushes the underside of cock as well as Eric's balls. 

Aaron settles back on his heels to watch the lurch and spasm of Eric’s dick as it begins to spurt without anything touching it.  The ejaculate flies without direction and Aaron moves his hand to stroke and guide the orgasm as he watches.  He wishes Eric were still wearing his dress shirt so that he could aim the semen up to stain into the expensive garment, but settles for taking it on his own cheap poly cotton tee.

As the hardened shaft begins to soften he bends forward to suck away the bead of fluid clinging to the tip and Eric’s hands clench into him at the attention to his sensitized glans, but he doesn’t push Aaron away so he adds a few licks before he releases the salty flesh.

He feels the sticky drops absorbing into his shirt and feels his own cock throb with neglect.  Eric’s hands move from Aaron’s shoulder to slide back to his face, fawning over his beard with soft scratches of fingernails and gliding rubs of his palms. 

He looks up to find Eric’s irises lost in the blackness of his dilated pupils; the man staring blindly down at him as his hands absorb the sight and feel of Aaron’s beard. 

Aaron lunges upward, dislodging the hands from his face and grabbing Eric’s clean shaven jaw to jerk his mouth open so Aaron can plunge his tongue right inside when their lips meet.  With his other hand he tears open his jeans; shoving the denim and his boxers down until his dick springs free of confinement. 

Eric is docile in repletion; sluggish in an almost drugged fashion that Aaron shouldn’t find as arousing as he does.  He takes the other man’s hand and shoves it towards his groin, guiding those slender fingers to wrap around his thick shaft and stroke. 

He bites back a groan at the feel of that hand upon him again and tears his mouth free to bury his face against Eric’s neck as he moves to thrust into the loose tunnel of the man’s grip.  His beard moves over pale skin and Eric’s hold tightens without encouragement.  He deliberately moves back to biting and nuzzling at the man’s nipples and Eric stirs from his daze to begin jerking Aaron off with his usual deliberation.  After several tugs that push the boundary between pleasure and pain he gives a twist of his wrist and swipe of his thumb to make Aaron break apart in his arms.

He feels himself spurting against the soft blend of wool and cashmere that comprises of the dress pants Eric is wearing and he bites at the man’s nipple with a little more enthusiasm at the realization that he’s leaving his stain on the quality fabric; uncaring in his orgasm that Byer will likely throw the clothing out with the same ambivalence with which he’ll likely dispatch Aaron some day.


	2. Chapter 2

Aaron wakes slowly to the feel of warm flesh sticking to his own and a cooling puddle of drool on his chest.  He doesn’t have to open his eyes to know the source of these things and he doesn’t _want_ to open them to confirm that Eric Byer does indeed drool in his sleep.

They didn’t sleep together; it was one of the biggest of their many spoken and unspoken rules.  They didn’t spend a whole night fucking themselves to exhaustion, either, which meant that Eric had intentionally broken the rules or decided to change them without telling Aaron.

There is a third option that Aaron doesn’t want to acknowledge but cannot go without addressing as his mind wakens; their game is over, the rules no longer apply.

He wants to untangle from the sprawl of Eric’s limp, lanky body and run from the likelihood of the latter being the case, but he remains still on the mattress as he admits that he has to know for certain, one way or another. 

After a few moments, he calms himself from his thoughts of what _this_ meant and allows himself to memorize the moment as he knows he’ll not have one like it again. 

All he’d ever wanted was a connection; to belong somewhere.  It was easy in the afterglow of a morning after to fool himself into thinking such a connection existed between him and the person sharing his bed. 

At least with Eric there was no romanticizing it as he had had it explained quite painfully very early on that they could and would never be _together_.  Despite those firmly uttered words after their first frantic session grinding together undercover of desert netting in Iraq, Aaron has had more of a relationship with Byer than anyone else in his life and that just went to show what a pitiful existence his has been.

As Sandra Bullock said in Speed, though, relationships formed under high stress situations never last. 

Ten years of random meetings seems a pretty impressive run from the moment that his convoy had come upon Eric’s downed aircraft in the desert.  He wonders sometimes what course they might have taken if that same convoy hadn’t driven into that makeshift minefield weeks after their meeting, setting the stage for Ken to die and Aaron to come to life; if Byer had never retired from active duty to take the helm at the Assay group. 

In all likelihood, Aaron knows, Ken Kitsom would never again have met the flyboy with that all too serious face capable of such a magical smile with sparkling blue eyes and he would have faded into obscurity; washed out from the service while Eric went on to do bigger, better things wherever he chose to go.

He thinks of all the times over the years when he had just wanted this; to hold the man and to be held by him without some mission bearing down on them.  For them to rest together, sated and safe behind actual doors with no imminent threat of said doors being busted down. He tries and fails to keep his hand from flexing against the dip of Eric’s spine to keep the man’s sleeping form against him. 

The pressure makes Eric stir, his fingers tightening their possessive grip on Aaron’s bicep.  

In addition to learning about the man’s apparent beard kink, the night had shown Aaron that Eric had a deep and abiding lust for the muscles that he had developed in his training as an operative.  He can see the marks all along both his arms from Eric’s biting teeth, sucking lips, squeezing fingers and scratching nails. 

It seems a cruelty for him to just now be discovering these things about the man, but Aaron knows that that is exactly _why_ this has to be the end of them. Somehow during all their fleeting moments together they had actually come to _know_ each other; at least as much as their jobs allowed.

Aaron tries not to left those kinds of thoughts detract from the moment as he focuses instead on the sight of his own marks left on the pale skin of Eric’s back and the slight curve of the man’s ass.  Most of his attentions had been to the man’s chest, though, and he knows that when Eric rises he’ll display nipples still dark and swollen from all the sucking and biting that Aaron had done in the hours of darkness.

He's actually surprised to be awakening first given how his whole body felt pleasantly abused and utterly used. Even with the physical enhancements to speed healing and limit pain or discomfort, he felt a welcome ache in muscles that hadn't been stretched since their last encounter. Given those enhancements, though, the twinges are likely psycho-semantic as he mind remembers the push of fingers spreading him open for Eric's cock more than his body still actually feels the gaping emptiness left when their bodies separated.

_It had all been so damned good._

He wants to do it again and that want spurs him to bend to press his nose against the top of Eric head, smiling at the tickle of the mussed strands.  The scent of _them_ invades his nostrils; a musky mix of sweat, cologne and semen that goes straight to his groin.  He savors it; knowing in the very core of himself that they'll not be doing this again. He’ll never smell it again, never have it again, never wallow in this again. 

A familiar chirp breaks the silence and he goes deadly still at the noise form Eric’s Blackberry.  It’s an alert of some kind. 

_A reminder to complete the mission and kill him now?_

Aaron looks toward the discarded pants on the floor where the noise came from and he debates his options.  He has a classic Welrod 9 mm under his pillow for easy access and a quiet kill; best suited for a hotel setting.  His KA-BAR is tucked carefully into the mattress to avoid detection by the maids while remaining readily available if needed. 

Not that any actual weapons are needed; his mind and body have been honed into the deadliest thing in the room and that included the C4 he had tucked in his Go Bag for the just in case he needed to blow something up.

Aaron doesn’t make any move, though, as Eric begins to stir.  He remains still and frozen with his head bent toward Eric’s.

It should have been gratifying that the waking man inches his body impossibly closer to Aaron’s while he turns blindly upward to seek out Aaron’s mouth for a sloppy, sleepy kiss that shouldn’t mean anything.

It means far more than even Aaron wants to consider and his hand slides up to fist in the short strands of hair at the back of Eric’s head to deepen the kiss into something more, uncaring of their morning breath made all the worse by the alcohol and come that had been in their mouths the night before.

The Blackberry sounds again; strident and invasive to end the moment in every possible way.

Aaron knows the exact moment when he loses the sleepy, sexy man in his arms and gets retired Air Force Colonel Eric Byer back in control.

Eric’s body goes slowly still, not making any sudden moves as he eases his tongue from Aaron’s mouth.  His blue eyes open to lock with Aaron’s; clear and unblinking, showing no emotion; giving no reaction to the thickening cocks sandwiched between their tightly pressed bodies.

Aaron knows that Eric is running through the same options that he had upon waking.  He knows that Eric knows exactly where the gun is and exactly where the knife is and the man is considering his chances at getting to either before an Outcome agent could snap his neck.

Neither of them moves towards the weapons and neither of them moves to snap any necks.

After a moment of intense study on both their parts, Eric cautiously untangles himself from Aaron; wriggling his left arm out from under Aaron’s hips and taking care not to knee him in the groin as he draws his right leg from where it had been pressed between Aaron’s thighs.  Aaron appreciates the gesture and tries not to shiver with regret at how slowly Eric’s foot moves over his calf during the separation.

They peel apart audibly, sweat and come having formed an adhesion between them that wanted to keep their stomachs pressed together.  They each wince, unbidden, as hairs tug and pull uncomfortably when their flesh separates. 

If it had been any other time or place they might have stopped and laughed to ease the tension; finding humor and reason for renewed arousal in the evidence of their debauchery the night before, but this was not that place and they had never had _that time_.

Aaron stays lying on the bed, loose limbed and seeming without a care in the world as Eric moves off the edge of the mattress without taking his eyes off the operative. 

Trusting was another one of those many things that they had never gotten around to doing together.

He resists the urge to cover himself with the sheet tangled around his left leg, but knows not to make any kind of movement in this moment.  He lies there naked in more ways than the obvious while Eric finds his discarded underwear and slips them on before retrieving his PDA. 

Only then does Eric look away, once he has the familiar weight of his Blackberry in hand like it’s the most vital weapon available to him.  Aaron supposes to a man like Byer the little device _is_ a vital weapon.  He can only imagine the data it contains and the people Eric can communicate with via the device; the orders he can make and the assignments he can demand carried out with the push of one single button on that little keyboard.

He track’s the man’s every move as Eric takes the phone into the bathroom and audibly locks himself in the room to check whatever messages the device had for him.

Aaron exhales a slow breath and sits up.  He drags the sheet up over his lap as he plants his feet on the floor facing the bathroom door and wonders how this scene is going to play out.  He scratches at the back of his head and neck with one hand while bracing the other on the edge of the mattress before casting a glance toward the pillows.  His shoulders slouch forward as part of him just wants to cave in upon himself, but he reaches for the pistol with a steadying breath.  He verifies that the chamber is clear, the magazine full and tightly attached then fingers the bolt, wondering if he can pull the trigger if he has to.

His steadying breath is exhaled shakily as he puts the gun on the tangled bedding beside him; easily accessible if needed and very visible to hopefully deter such a need from arising.

He rubs tiredly at his eyes and runs his hand down over his face.  He freezes upon contact with the beard he’d grown while imbedded with the Óglaigh na hÉireann.  His time with the Irish extremist group is something he wants to think about even less than he wants to think about how his whiskers got flaky with dried spunk and saliva that makes his chin itch. 

He refuses to close his eyes and remember any one of the many times that his beard had caressed Eric’s cock or the one time that he had allowed the man to jerk off on his face so that he could suck the semen from Aaron’s facial hair.  Instead he thinks about the electric razor in his Go Bag and wonders if it would affect Eric at all to find the beard gone when he comes out of the bathroom.

He stays where he is, dropping the hand from his face to plant it against the bed while going back to staring fixedly at the barrier between him and the other man.

The one primary truth that he grapples with is the knowledge that he’d hesitate to reach for his weapon if Eric comes out guns blazing.  His enhanced mind has hoarded every single encounter with the man; crystallized every memory and he can’t imagine being responsible for Byer’s death.  He tries to imagine them facing off, guns drawn and can only remember them huddled together in shadows, hands grabbing for flesh and contact and release. 

All along Eric has warned him against developing any feelings between them; had made it loud and clear from the first furtive glance that there were only a few possible outcomes from their encounters and all of them would be bad for Aaron if he involved more than his body.

He’d like to think that more than flesh had been involved on both sides last night, but he had to face the fact that it was unlikely for Eric.

The man was ten years older than Aaron chronologically and decades more mature cynically.  Aaron wouldn’t be at all surprised if he were already toe tagged and heading for cremation in Eric’s detached mind.

Eric is a consummate professional; if Aaron has gone off grid to defect from the program then Byer will burn him in a heartbeat.  It’s just the way the man is wired to function; to survive.  Eric put his commitment to country above any possibility of love; never even considering the idea of finding a woman to procreate with to pass on his genetics to a new generation as ‘family’ only equaled weakness in his line of work; gave enemies a nice big target to strike at.

Last night could have been the start of something real and good between them, but Aaron knows that to Eric it will have been a mistake; a blurring of lines between them that the man needed kept as solid and impassible boundaries in order to function.   

Somehow this kind of thing had never hurt as much when he was Ken Kitsom; possibly because the poor kid that he had been had never had a chance to experience anything like he has with Byer.

He hears the toilet flush and followed by the faucets turning on at the sink and he tenses.  The lock clicks open, but there’s a hesitation before the knob turns to open the door.

Aaron looks to his gun then takes a breath, grips the edge of the bed tighter and looks back at the door as the handle turns.  It opens slowly and he knows Eric is waiting for him to be there with the gun in his face; he’s bracing for the bullet that Aaron can’t fire. 

When the door swings fully open and Byer peers into the room.  His eyes go from Aaron sitting on the edge of the bed to the weapon lying black and deadly as a coiled snake on the bedding; Aaron stiffens at the man’s expression which tells him that he _should have_ taken the shot.  The look says Aaron has failed some unknown test and he foolishly wants to ask to take it again, but knows he still wouldn’t threaten the other man’s life without a severe and direct threat against himself first.

“Since it’s apparent you won’t go back to Belfast,” Eric says after a moment, moving further into the room to gather his clothing; “we’re pulling you in for a training run.”

It’s the first shop talk they’ve done this whole encounter and the attempt at what passes for normalcy between them hits Aaron like a fist to the chest.  Eric has and never had had any intentions of actually getting his own hands dirty by executing Aaron himself.  There would never be a confrontation for them over raised weapons with the knowledge that only one of them could walk away alive.  Eric would always have himself an operative to eliminate any threat Aaron poses. 

It was twisted, he knew, but if he was going to die for _this_ he as least wanted Eric to be the last thing that he saw.  Maybe Byer had felt a similar regret when he slipped out of the bathroom and found himself moving without bullet holes.

_He has no idea how or when they had become such a God-awful mess._

“Training?” he strives for a vaguely interested tone but the word comes out a gruff rasp being the first attempt at speech that he’s made in hours.

“Alaska,” Eric tucks his tee shirt into the waist of his soiled pants and shrugs on his torn dress shirt to hang open over his torso. 

“So I finally get to tackle the frigid bitch?” he smirks with some actual surprise at the idea of tackling the training course used by several military special operation groups.

He’s heard of it, along with several other places while liaising with Navy SEALs, Army Rangers, Green Berets and other government security groups that had codenames not to be bandied about.  The course in Alaska was long, cold and bleak. 

 _Quite fitting,_ Aaron supposes, _for a travel destination after having apparently been dumped by Eric Byer._

He pushes up from the bed, thinking longingly of the large shower in the bathroom while moving to locate his boxers on the floor.  He feels Eric’s eyes on his ass as he bends to draw the underwear on and he deliberately slows in pulling the elastic waist up over the curve of his backside.  He casts a look over his shoulder, hating himself for being unable to stifle the want to tumble back into bed and pretend like they were nothing more than reunited lovers locked together in a Vegas hotel room.  He stills when he sees an unfamiliar expression on Byer’s face, an expression that somehow seems to embody the same times that Aaron feels, but he know that that can’t be right because Eric doesn’t bring emotions into any of this.

Regret doesn’t look right on the man and Aaron turns away from it with a knot forming in his throat as he moves around the room to put clean clothes over his filthy body. 

“Your plane leaves in two hours,” Eric says briskly.  “Ticket’s at the front desk for your check-out.”

“Commercial?” he asks with a faint frown, glancing at the weapon on the bed and thinking of the others he has in his possession.

“Your credentials will get you through security.  You may want to dump the explosives, though,” the corner of his mouth ticks up in grin that gone before Aaron can even hope to memorize it. 

Aaron nods, taking that last bit as actual advice even if the man had intended them as a joke. 

He puts on a pair of steel toed work boots then moves around the room to gather his meager possessions and shove them in his rucksack.  Neither of them speaks as he goes through the familiar motions under Eric’s unusually intent regard.  His last actions are to collect the weaponry from the bed.

The KA-BAR he pulls outs, checks the blade for any nicks then he slips the knife into the sheathe that he has built into any pair of shoes he buys.  When he picks up the gun his eyes go, unbidden, to Eric as he unclips the magazine grip to store the weapon in his bag.

“That might have been your only chance,” the man observes quietly from the position that he has taken against the wall; acknowledging the lethal tension between them for the first time.

“There have been others,” Aaron replies just as quietly as he fastens the bag closed, “if I had ever wanted to take them.”

Their eyes meet as the words hang between them; each of them taking their own meaning from the comment.  Eric’s gaze flickers away first and Aaron feels a hollow victory at knowing the he is perhaps the only person that can beat Byer at a staring contest.  The man looks at the wrecked bed and his hand moves unconsciously to scratch at his chest.  He licks his lips and seems to want to say something but the moment passes without any revelations.

Aaron has never really expected anything from the man but it still feels like a defeat as he shrugs into the leather bomber jacket that’s ill-advised for Las Vegas in the summer, but damned necessary for a destination in Alaska that flirted with the boundaries of the Arctic Circle.  He shoulders the strap of his rucksack and grabs the room key in preparation to put this whole interlude behind them.

Eric straightens from the wall as Aaron moves past to leave the room.  Aaron lowers his head to stare at the carpet while keeping his grip tight on his bag as he avoids the good-bye that they never say.  He feels the tension in Eric that speaks of the man having something that he wanted to say or do and Aaron finds himself all but praying that the man doesn’t actually _say_ good-bye this time.

He checks the peep hole for a glimpse into the corridor before opening the door to lean out and check the hallway for any danger.  He sees discarded food trays set outside of a few doors awaiting pick-up from room service and he sees the maid’s cart at the far end of the hall set to begin making its way through the floor to ready it for new guests.  Nothing is out of sync with how things should be as check-out time approaches at a hotel and he turns to signal Eric that the coast is clear of prying eyes and potential hazards.

He freezes in mid-turn when a familiar hand touches down on his shoulder and grips; the hold firm and strong and steadying in a way that Aaron had become used to.

“Aaron,” Eric says, moving in closer when he doesn’t… _can’t_ look up in response to that touch.

He feels the warmth of the man and swelters inside his coat while the hand massages into the side of his neck as Aaron hovers on the threshold.  He wants to look back; wants to hear what the man may have to say, but he finds himself paralyzed in the moment.

“Coast is clear,” his voice rasps out.  “We should go now.”

The tension in the body behind him transfers into him through the fingers that slowly still in their unconsciously kneading of the muscles at Aaron’s nape.  He feels that same tautness within himself; words and actions kept bottled up for so long and contained so carefully within them that it would serve little purpose to let any of it out now. 

Unless Aaron has read all of this wrong and it isn’t the intended as one last time before it’s all swept under the rug forever.  He wonders if Eric wants to hear what Aaron would confess as much as Aaron would love to know what’s itching on the tip of Eric’s nimble tongue to be spoken. 

“Right,” the man exhales after a seemingly endless silence.  “Right,” he repeats himself and Aaron blinks because Eric Byer has never had to repeat himself.

His head finally turns to look back at the man, but Eric is already moving forward to brush past Aaron to slip out into the hallway.  Aaron licks his lips, wondering if he should risk it; just put out a hand to stop the other man from leaving as Eric had just tried to stop him.

Aaron does nothing but stands there in the open doorway and watch as Eric takes several steps down the corridor toward the elevators.  His mouth opens and closes over thoughts racing through his head with nothing managing to spill out.

He watches Eric step forward to press the elevator call button; going up apparently to a room he’s likely taken in the hotel so that he can store his things privately and get cleaned up without intrusions.  Eric stares at the illuminated button as he waits for the elevator to arrive then looks down at his shoes, frowning as he no doubt notices that he’d scuffed the leather with his careless disregard for removing the loafers in his race to get naked the night before. 

“Good luck, Aaron,” suddenly his eyes are looking into Aaron’s and the soft, somber words carry a might punch over the distance between them.

A thought clicks into Aaron’s head and he finally has something to say and it’s the last thing he ever would have expected to hear himself saying.

“Goodbye, Eric,” he looks down to thread his other arm through the dangling strap of his backpack then moves quickly to close the room door and bolt for the stairs without waiting to see how or even if the other man reacts to the words.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Eric isn’t surprised to arrive at his town house in Reston, Virginia to find a small unmarked package on his doorstep.

His surprise stems from two things; firstly, the fact that it’s taken four months for the package to arrive and secondly, he’s surprised at the rush of relief he feels at seeing it on his stoop.

He stifles his reaction and bends to pick it up along with his copy of the Washington Post and collects his mail from the box before he lets himself inside for the evening.  The mail is junk and tossed aside. The paper holds no actual news for him with all the ears that he has to the ground.  Anything truly newsworthy would have been filtered to him long before it went to print; that’s what he has Dita for.  He folds the paper open to the crossword to work on later then tosses it on the side table set next to his recliner. 

The box he carries with him up the stairs to his bedroom.

He sets it on the dresser then goes about his routine of stripping off the three piece suit that has replaced his fatigues and Service Dress as uniform since moving to the civilian sector.  He hangs the suit to be dropped at the dry cleaners then stands in his boxers considering what to dress in next.  He has no plans to go out aside from his daily jog, but that in no way means that he’s in for the night and allowed to dress down accordingly. 

With the heightened state of alert they remain in given the unknown status and locations of both Jason Bourne and Aaron Cross, Eric is never truly off the clock.  His Blackberry is rarely silent for longer than an hour unless he has deliberately turns it off which he can seldom allow himself to do. 

His eyes go to the little brown box resting so unassumingly on his dresser and he moves toward it with nothing else to do at that particular moment. 

The Government man within in cringes at the idea of just opening the nondescript package without investigating it’s source further, but the _man_ man inside him knows that it can only be from one person.

He uses the knife that he keeps in the nightstand to cut the tape and open the flaps.  Inside is a simple cell phone; small, cheap, prepaid and disposable.  A burn phone.  Traceable only if Eric wants to make it so.

His eyes go to the place on the nightstand where he routinely sets his PDA while changing and he knows that he can have the brain brigade tracing the object back to its very creation then forwards again until they determine when and where Cross bought it then sussed out how the man had gotten it to Eric’s home.

Eric looks back at the cell in his hand and knows he won’t be calling anyone; this phone is for a call that he must and will wait for to come in.

He powers the phone up to see if it even has a charge and it glows brightly to life with a chime of music to identify the prepaid carrier.  He grimaces at the glow and noise frowning through it until he can see on the display that the battery is fully charged and the unit has sixty minutes on it.

For some reason that strikes a chord within him; sixty minutes.

Part of him thinks with a bit of a sneer that they’ve never spent sixty minutes _talking_ in all the time that they had known one another. 

Part of him thinks that sixty minutes isn’t nearly enough to say what has been building inside him for months to say.  The things that he had so very nearly allowed to slip during their last encounter in Vegas and words that had been souring on his tongue since Dita announced that Aaron’s tracker was still live after they’d ordered the drone to blow up the cabin in Alaska to eliminate Subjects #3 & #5 in what should have been one neat, tidy and relatively painless fell swoop. 

He wanted to tell Aaron that he hadn’t known when he sent the man up there; wanted to explain that the training had been intended as nothing more than a smack on the nose for being a disobedient puppy and going somewhere other than the paper it was supposed to use. 

Eric had known that it was the last time that he could allow them to get together like _that_ , but he’d had no intention of losing Aaron as an operative.  Once the man had completed the course and his blood work had been verified to show that he had stayed with the program while off grid then Eric would have made sure that Aaron’s handler put the man back on the right track.  Aaron would have gone back in with the IRA for more intelligence about the guns the group ran and the bombings there plotting with increasing frequency. If, after everything, Ireland were truly such a sore point for Aaron, Eric would have used his pull to put the man in another location.

Only Aaron ever gotten explanations or leniency and Eric has known from the start that such tenderness would lead to suffering.  He had just never really expecting himself to be the one hurting from it all.

The phone in his hand vibrates and makes another awful racket to announce a text message and .5 units are deducted from the display when Eric immediately clicks to open the message.

“Tonight,” is all the text that displays on the screen.

Nothing to confirm Aaron’s identity as the sender and Eric pushes the man’s name into a reply text but deletes it without sending.

He now has fifty-nine minutes and thirty seconds to talk to the other man and he wants to hear that voice not waste any more units on empty text.

 _Tonight_ is vague and open-ended and Eric resists the urge to demand clarification.  He likes specificity and “Tonight” is infuriatingly non-specific.

He looks at his Rolex and sees that it’s 5:45pm, considered evening by most.  6pm tended to bring the dinner hour which heralded ‘night’... when the hell would Aaron call? 

_And what should he do in the meantime?_

He verifies the timestamp on the message to make sure that it hasn’t been waiting for him since the day before as he had spent the night at the office putting out fires still flaring up because of journalists intrigued by the story that Pam Landy had told and still has yet to formally retract despite the threat of an official treason charge.

The message appeared to have been sent within moments of Eric turning the cell on and he’s half tempted to contact Ingram to see if there was already a trace on the phone and, if so, where it originated from.

The idea that Aaron is in the area, somewhere close enough to monitor the device; maybe to have even delivered the package personally to Eric’s home ... it makes something twitch inside him.  He puts the cell on the nightstand beside his Blackberry and moves into the bathroom to shower. 

He hadn’t planned to bother until after his run, but he justifies the cleansing as his not having washed properly at the office, just applying fresh deodorant and cologne to cover any body odor that might have been.  He makes no attempt at acknowledging or justifying the thickening shaft that has him turning the temperature to its coldest setting until his teeth chatter from the icy spray and he cuts it off to exit.

He towels off and avoids his reflection in the mirror as he always avoids looking himself in the eye these days.  He moves into his room to pull on a pair of black flannel pants and a blue polo; comfortable enough to lounge in but business casual enough for any surprise visitors from work.  He pulls on a pair of black socks to keep his bare feet from flapping against the floor then looks at the phones for a moment before scooping them both up to head back downstairs.

He goes to the kitchen to study the contents of his refrigerator then the freezer and finally his pantry without seeing anything of interest to eat.  He looks at the takeout menus clipped to the fridge and considers calling in an order for some Chinese.  Somehow that leads to a fantasy of Aaron intercepting the delivery boy and being there on his doorstep with the order when Eric responds to the ringing of his doorbell and Eric swipes the menus, clip and all, from the fridge to deposit them in the trash can.

He feels restless and looks longingly towards the worn sneakers inside the back door, but it’s far too early for him to jog. 

He varies his routine out of necessity; being predictable could be deadly in his line of work, but he still keeps his running in the darkness.  The streets are quieter as everyone else retreats to the supposed safety of their homes when night falls.  The potential for danger is an element that attracts Eric to the night runs. 

This was a good neighborhood, but when he had a lot to mull over he tended to run into the shadier areas and some poor kid had actually tried to mug him once.  Eric seldom had an opportunity to utilize his hand-to-hand combat training and he’d enjoyed disarming the kid.  He still had that switchblade somewhere.

Sparring felt like a good idea and he considers going to the gym to see if anyone is around to get in the ring with.  That would involve getting back in his car, though, and _going_ somewhere and there was the risk of getting caught up in a match and missing the ringing of the cell phone because he hadn’t known that _that_ was the time that **_tonight_** had meant.

_Goddamn, but he hated bad intel and vague data._

He grabs a bottle of water from the refrigerator then moves from the kitchen to his den and sits in his recliner.  He opens the bottle to take a drink before setting it on the side table.  He reaches for the paper and his ink pen while frowning at the reading glasses folded on the wooden surface.

Ignoring the glasses he turns on the lamp and tries to settle back comfortably in the chair.  The lumps in his pockets are a distraction, so he fishes both devices out; tossing the Blackberry to the table while carefully placing the prepaid near his reading classes out of the way of any condensation that might run from his water bottle.

Relieved of the burdens, he focuses on the crossword staring at the grid of white boxes and blacked out spaces thinking of all the files he’s been shredding and words that he himself has been blacking out to limit the scope of damage done to Outcome because the CIA couldn’t handle their own shit with Treadstone.

His fingers crumple the edges of the paper at that line of thought and he forcibly relaxes them with a deep draw of air in through his nose then lets it out in a controlled released from his mouth.  His left hand smoothes the wrinkles from the paper while he rubs at his forehead with the fingers of his right.

He looks at the clues and tries to figure out if he even cares what a Pad Thai garnish is or what member of the service could fit in six squares.  He sits forward and frowns at that one, running through all the branches of domestic and foreign military that he knows and trying to narrow the field down to six letters that also slot in with the clues across like pigeon pad and mod finale. 

Just like that, the puzzle has drawn him in as a distraction until he sorts out that the “service” does not refer to anything military as ‘teacup’ makes itself evident as the answer to 8 down.  Mildly disappointed by that he looks up from the paper and finds his eyes going to the prepaid and then to the darkness that has overtaken the world outside his window.

He reaches for his PDA to check the time finding that two hours have passed since he sat down. 

Eric blinks at that and looks to the clock on the wall to confirm the information because it’s never taken him more than an hour to complete a crossword when that was _all_ that he had been doing.  This further evidence of how Aaron’s little present has thrown him makes Eric glare at the cell phone and leave the damned thing behind as he goes to use the bathroom.

He uses and flushes the toilet then turns on the taps to wash his hands before cutting the water off quickly to dash into the den to swipe up the phone and make sure he hadn’t missed it’s ring. 

He wonders if Aaron is somewhere watching this; laughing at the power only he has to make Eric leap through hoops.  He’d like to think that he’d never shown the other man that he had such power, but he honestly doubts that he had been successful; especially there at the last. 

Aaron with a beard had always just _gotten_ to Eric and everything that he had meant to say and do when he went to retrieve the man had just gone from his head when he’d seen Aaron’s slouched so dejectedly over the bar with that fuzz on his face.  There had been other reasons that Eric didn’t care to explore as to why he’d scrapped all his practiced talk about God and country and honor and duty to try rah-rahhing the man back on to a flight to London to catch a connection back into Ireland.  He’d seen a chance for one more time and taken it for them both.

It hadn’t done a damned thing to help him for this time without the other man and he can’t help but wonder if Aaron thinks about it and, if so, how it makes him feel after everything that happened in Alaska and Manila.  That leads to Eric wondering how and _why_ Aaron went from Alaska to Shearing’s place in Maryland.  It leads to him thinking about Aaron _with_ Marta Shearing and wondering when that had happened and how and exactly how the hell that bit of information had never been brought to his attention. 

Dita had assured him in the aftermath that there had been nothing to flag the two as having any connection other than doctor and patient, but Eric knew that meant nothing because he had made it his mission to make sure than nothing ever flagged his relationship with the man as more than agent and temporary handler.

They’re been on the run and off the radar for four months and Eric seethed with the want to know how and where.  More importantly he wanted to know the depth of their relationship.  He has no doubt that Aaron is fucking the woman; he wants to know when Aaron starting doing it.  To know if Aaron had been secreting time with his doctor that he could have been sneaking to be with Eric.

Eric puts the phone carefully back on the table to keep himself from throwing it against the wall before he runs up the stairs to change into a pair of shorts and grab his light hoodie to run in.  He grabs the hands free headset from his desk and grabs the prepaid without a glance at his Blackberry.  He plugs the headset into the headphone jack on the little phone and makes sure it’s equipped for hands free usage.  The fact that it is set up for the headset doesn’t exactly tell him how new the model is, but something tells him that it hadn’t been purchased more than a week ago; if that.

He tucks the phone into his pocket and positions the earpiece as comfortably as possible in his right ear before moving to step into his sneakers.  He grabs a fresh bottle of water to tuck into the pouch of his hoodie, tucks a house key into his left shoe, sets the alarm then slips from the house; taking care to lock up behind him.

He starts out at a walk to stretch himself out and limber up before picking up pace to jog.  He’s four blocks away from his house and giving serious thought to breaking into a run to burn off his restlessness when the phone vibrates in his pockets to precede the musical tones of its ring to indicate an incoming call.

Eric stops dead in his tracks and fumbles for the cell before getting tangled in the cord of the headset to remind himself that he has it set for hands free operation and he tries not to let his awkwardness show as he presses the button on the earpiece to answer the call just before the third ring fades out.

He offers no greeting as he gulps in air; ready to use his jogging as an excuse for breathlessness.

“Are we alone?”

The language is Russian but the voice is undeniably Cross.

“Da,” Eric replies wondering if he’ll have to blow the dust off of his knowledge of the language to carry out this conversation. 

If so, he can see how it would eat up sixty minutes.

“So,” Aaron sighs in English, “had any good Operatives killed lately?”

The attempt at humor has Eric gritting his teeth and counting to ten.

“You know, I hadn’t expected much for quality with these little dealies, but I have got to say, the sound is so clear I can hear the enamel grinding away.”

Eric immediately unlocks his jaw and looks around him, not believing for a second that Aaron could have _heard_ him gritting his teeth.  His pulse quickens at the idea of Aaron in the shadows somewhere, watching him. 

“Did you find me yet?” Aaron’s voice moves playfully into his ear as Eric does a complete 360 again and then again; faster then slower then slower still with each visual sweep coming up empty for any possible sign of the other man.  “No?  Guess that’s kind of your problem now, isn’t it?  Can’t find me or this Bourne guy.  Are there any others out there that slipped your noose?”

“Aaron,” Eric grits the name out to signify his lack of amusement.

There’s no retort to that and the line falls silent on both ends until Eric pulls out the phone to make sure that he’s still actually _in_ a phone call.  The display tells him that he has forty-five units remaining and he wants to argue with is that there is no way they’re already been on at this for almost fifteen minutes.

“You look tired,” Aaron says quietly in his ear and Eric drops the phone as if it burnt him.  “I’m not watching you, not right now, so you can stop looking.” 

He can hear the smile in the other man’s voice and can imagine it clearly in his mind complete with the wrinkles of skin at the corners of Aaron’s mouth and eyes.

“You’re stateside?” he hears himself asking in place of demanding to know exactly where in Reston the man is at that particular moment.

“That’s the great thing about this tech savvy era we’re in, I don’t have to be over your shoulder to watch you any more.  I might be in the states or I could be in Canada.  Maybe I’m back in Ireland or maybe I’ve never left the Philippines.  I have to say, Eric, it kind of tickles me that you honestly have _no idea_ where I am.  Not so fun for you without that beacon in me is-”

“I thought you were dead,” Eric confesses and the flow of words immediately stops from the other end. 

There’s a pause that begins and grows until Eric envisions the counter running down on the time left on the prepaid.

“The clean-up crew found your blood on the scene when they went to scrape up what you did to LARX.”

“Larx?” Aaron’s soft laugh huffs through the earpiece.  “What kind of name is that?”

Eric sighs, dropping his head forward to rub at the migraine he feels coming.  Project codenames is not what he wants to spend their time talking about.

“Is she with you?”

“She’s safe,” is all that Aaron reveals and Eric feels his teeth grind at the quietly conveyed message that _that_ was all that mattered to the other man; that the doctor be safe from this mess.

The questions weigh down his tongue; he has so many to ask about _them_ and he’s grateful for the deluge that renders him unable to speak for the moment.

“I can use it,” he blurts out.  “This doesn’t have to go on any longer.  We can check you off as killed in Manila and I can direct the focus back where it belongs; Bourne; not you, not Outcome.”

“If…”

“I need you to come in,” he says the words then curses himself.  “Just...come to me, Aaron.”

“And Marta?”

Eric has no answer to that one and offers no empty promises for her safety because it’s frankly something that he has given no thought to.

“You love her?” he asks despite it revealing that he cares about the answer to such a question.

“You know she never would have even known my name if not for all of this?” Aaron dodges the question and Eric knows that he’s been given the answer that he hadn’t wanted.  “I was just a number on a chart; our files didn’t even have names on them.  Why is that always the first thing you take away?  Names mean something, sure, but we’re more than a name.  Why do you always try to erase the names?”

“Because it’s your identity,” he answers regretting the way that he gets, rightfully, lumped in with the ubiquitous ‘them’ that conspiracy theorists loved.  “If you give that up and let us give you another one then that means we truly have you in the program.”

“Huh.  Bet you guys spent lots of time and money figuring that out.”

There’s another lull and Eric hears a faint rustle of paper on the other end of the line.

“You never were the best at pop culture references,” Aaron muses from out of nowhere.  “Loeb.  L-o-e-b.  Four letter answer to “Stay (I Missed You)” singer Lisa.  Was a good song,” there’s a heavy pause on the other end as the deeper meaning of the words hits Eric like a brick.  “I guess you really wouldn’t know anything about it, though, all things considered.”

There’s a rustle again of paper and Eric’s feet are running before he realizes that his brain is functioning enough to give the order for his body to move.

“Aaron, stay there,” he orders toward the speaker of his headset as he wonders how quickly he can cover the distance back to his house.

There’s no reply to his shout and he moves faster until he can’t hear anything over the thud of his shoes, the pound of his pulse and the pants of his breath.  He had travelled a distance of approximately 2,200 feet, almost half a mile and he can still make a mile in under ten minutes so he estimates he makes the sprint in about three minutes but the time it takes still isn’t fast enough.

His back door is unlocked when he tries the knob but the alarm starts to screech when he makes to rush in without entering the security code.  He jams in the numbers to silence the noise then skids into the den to find it empty. 

The newspaper is folded on the side table where he had left it, but there’s now a cell phone on it that is almost identical to the one in Eric’s pocket.  He picks up the discarded phone and glances at the crossword. 

10 down has been filled in with the answer Loeb. _Clever_.

His reading glasses have writing on them that appears to be done in permanent marker; C-U on the right lens, T-E on the left.  _Cute_.  _**Real cute**_.

His Blackberry is gone. _Shit._

The prepaid in his pocket makes a noise and he pulls it out to see a warning that his minutes are about to expire.  He pulls the earbud out of his ear and watches the time run down until the phone goes black in his hand; rendered useless unless or until additional time is purchased. 

His time had run out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All crossword references are taken from an actual Washington Post crossword; August 28, 2012 "Box Office Receipts" by Bob Klahn and you can complete/find said puzzle here: http://games.washingtonpost.com/games/daily-crossword/daily-crossword.aspx


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